


Rattled

by Sneakyfox55



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Adorable Papyrus (Undertale), Bad Flirting, Bad Puns, Because I can, Big Brother Sans (Undertale), Birds, Coffee, Coffee Shops, Crush at First Sight, Crushes, Everyone has their act together for once, F/M, Fluff, Frisk (Undertale) Has Issues, Papyrus (Undertale) Knows More Than He Lets On, Papyrus (Undertale) Remembers Resets, Reader Has A Name, Reader Is Not Chara (Undertale), Reader Is Not Frisk (Undertale), Reader is weird, Sans (Undertale) Remembers Resets, Suggestive Themes, and Sans a lil bit, except maaaybe Frisk, fast burn, it's more so just for giggles, just a bit, like really jerky ones, like really weird, more or less, oh there's also jerky humans, papyrus is a dork, reader is a dork, reader is female, she's also kind of an OC i guess
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:34:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25365424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sneakyfox55/pseuds/Sneakyfox55
Summary: In which one encounter with a peculiar human gets under Papyrus's metaphorical skin.
Relationships: Papyrus (Undertale)/Reader
Comments: 10
Kudos: 51





	1. The Dating Manual Didn't Say Anything About This!

**Author's Note:**

> i'm (kind of) on a roll with writing and Papyrus needs more love so have this mess
> 
> i don't know how long it'll be, we'll just have to see :')

The day started off normally, all things considered—the sun had come up as it always did, the temperature was a nice mix of warm but not too warm, and there weren’t many clouds in the sky. Normally on a day like this, Papyrus might do something better with his time other than simply going to the grocery store. But alas, the birdfeeder was empty and they had no birdfeed left to put in it; to Target it was.

Papyrus wasn’t the biggest fan of human grocery stores but they did their job well. He wished they’d stock up more on monster food items, but again, he really shouldn’t be complaining. Overall they were okay experiences—today was no exception. He only got a total of four weird looks from humans, and he’d count that as a definite win.

Unfortunately as he was walking out of the store, he realized he failed to remember he had needed to buy some more coffee, as they were out of that too. However, he didn’t really like the idea of going back into Target—Not because the humans there were rude at all! It was just tedious!—so with a designated sigh he simply decided to drive back home...

Until he saw a little coffee shop a few blocks away from home.

Needless to say, Papyrus doesn’t usually drink coffee that much; unlike his brother Sans, who drinks it almost constantly just to stay awake, he doesn’t have a problem with being tired. He does like coffee, to a certain extent (as long as there’s lots and lots of cream and sugar in it), but he has no real reason to drink it. (Plus, he gets a bit jittery, and it affects his thinking somewhat, which doesn’t always lead to good things.)

But today, for some reason, seemed to be different. He wasn’t _tired_ , per se, but he felt almost... Fatigued, with everything that had been going on. (Not that anything was _wrong_.) He didn’t feel sleepy, it was just this kind of... Heaviness. And coffee sounded really good right then, for whatever it was that was happening to him.

So, he made a split-second decision to enter the coffee shop, opening the doors and stepping in while pretending not to notice the ~~hateful~~ ~~fearful~~ slightly _confused_ looks that the people inside threw his way. He marched right up the counter, and greeted the human barista with a beaming smile. “GOOD AFTERNOON, HUMAN!!” he proclaimed, and he didn’t know why but she shrank back for some reason. She was probably intimidated by him—in that case he couldn’t fault her for it, this _was_ her first time meeting him, after all. “I WOULD LIKE... UM...”

Oh dear, he hadn’t even looked over the menu. Better do it now, he supposed.

“...THAT FLUFFY THING! A ‘MOCHA FRAPPE,’ IS IT?”

She squeaked out a yes, and he stood a bit taller as she hastily scribbled down his order on some paper; wow, if she was _this_ flighty, she must have _really_ thought he was cool!

“I-it’ll be out in a minute, uh....? Sir!” she blurted out suddenly, and he grinned brightly back.

“THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE, KIND HUMAN! I SHALL GO WAIT OVER HERE!!”

He decided not to bestow any further awestruck terror on her by offering to shake her hand and instead strode over to sit in one of the unoccupied chairs at an empty table. During his time waiting, he looked out the window closest to him, watching the outside passerby’s, humans and monsters alike.

Five minutes passed, and still no frappe—but the doors did swing open, and without thinking he glanced up to see who the new customer was: it was a rather short human girl, wearing a gray hoodie and dark blue sweatpants. A bright red baseball cap also perched on top of her head, though she had it on sideways, and she kept her focus on a phone she had in her hand.

Not particularly interested in this new human, Papyrus turned back to looking around the small coffee shop, tapping his gloved hands on the table absentmindedly. He figured she’d probably go up to the counter and order something, or maybe sit down somewhere.

...

Rather, the weirdest thing happened.

The chair opposite to him was pulled out, scraping gratingly along the tiled floor, until the person pulling it out plopped into it. That person being the human who just entered.

Without saying anything to him she tugged off her baseball cap and set it down on the table in front of her, eyes still glued to her phone. Papyrus merely sat in his own chair, frozen on the spot, entirely bewildered as to why she’d choose to sit here, of all places.

“...UM...?”

His voice came out uncertainly, but it did the trick, seemingly—she immediately glanced up to look at him. Then she did the second weirdest thing she could have done:

She pointed at him with her fingers in the shape of a gun, clicked her tongue, and said in a very seductive(?!) voice, “You got any healing magic? ‘Cause I scraped my knees falling for you.”

...

Then she just went back to looking at her phone.

Papyrus tried to stammer out a response, certain his skull was several different shades of orange, but the human’s attention was glued elsewhere anyway.

...Wh—

 _What was that?!_ He was not prepared!

Of _course_ she’d find him charming, but they hadn’t had their first date yet, nor had he introduced himself! He didn’t even have the Dating Manual with him!

Unthinkable! How could this have happened?

...

Why couldn’t he think of a way to deflect the human’s advances with one of his own?!

“’EY, MONSTER!”

Papyrus tried to blink out of his daze to look in the direction of the voice; a young man with frankly messy facial hair was waving him over, a gruff look on his face, while the nice human lady that took his order cowered behind.

The ~~flustered~~ disgruntled skeleton rose to his feet and trudged back over to the desk, replacing his slight scowl with a friendly smile once more. The male human shoved a cup of coffee over, though it was noticeably not what he ordered.

Ah, it didn’t matter. He still appreciated their kindness!

“THANK YOU!!” he exclaimed, going to take the cup, but the man gave him a glare, yanking it back and gesturing with his palm outward.

Oh, right.

Papyrus gladly put a couple of dollars in the human’s palm, but he gestured for more. Alright, fair enough—it was probably very expensive here, after all, with the service quality!

Still with a pleasant grin he handed the man more of his money. “THAT SHOULD...”

But he shook his head.

Papyrus’s grin faltered.

Now he was sure something was off... Surely a simple cup of coffee couldn’t cost _that_ much?

“...I... I’M SORRY, BUT I THINK YOU’RE A BIT MISTAKEN, HUMAN—”

“No,” the man snarled, “I’m not ‘mistaken.’ You want this, you pay for it, got that?”

“BUT I—” He glanced up a the menu above, his frown deepening, “IT—IT SAYS RIGHT THERE IT SHOULD ONLY BE—”

“Yo, Joe, how’s it hanging?”

Papyrus almost flinched, as a new voice from beside him entered the scene; he turned to see who it was, only to falter, recognizing that weird human who flirted with him before. She seemed particularly occupied with meeting the man’s gaze, though when she caught Papyrus staring, she sent him a wink that made his face feel hot again.

“Wha—” the man—presumably Joe, as she called him—spluttered. “Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something here?!”

“Yeah, yeah,” she flapped her hand at him nonchalantly, “thing is, though; you’re kinda bumping my friend off here.”

Papyrus glanced around, trying to locate what “friend” she might be talking about, when Joe snorted.

“ _Seriously_? We’re gonna do this song and dance again?”

She narrowed her eyes, and Papyrus just shifted slightly, confused.

“Lay off or else,” she snapped suddenly, and the man laughed, shaking his head amusedly as he threw up his hands in mock surrender.

“Fine, fine—whatever. Take it for free.”

With that, she snatched the coffee cup from him, further bewildering the skeleton next to her.

“But if that thing—”

Papyrus watched her glare harden further.

“sorry, _he_ comes back ‘ere, I’m not gonna be so nice, ‘kay?”

“Noted,” the girl snarled, before starting to stomp away; for whatever reason, she looked back at Papyrus a moment later, and beckoned to him. “Hey, I don’t bite—usually,” she informed him, and with no other response to give, he followed her back to the table they previously sat at.

Before sitting down, she handed him the cup of coffee; she made no remark about his hesitation before taking it and went on, “Lucky they gave you anything. Probably had a different order though, huh?”

She took his silence as a yes.

“Anyway, sorry about that. Joe’s usually a stand-up guy, I swear. Just a little... Biased.”

With a little hum, she proceeded to plop down in her previous seat. Papyrus paused, before taking his own seat.

“THANK YOU,” he said, offering her a weary smile, and she grinned back.

Then he remembered what she had said, back there.

“...YOU...” He fidgeted. “YOU CALLED ME YOUR FRIEND...?”

She blinked, her smile fading a bit. “Oh, sorry,” she said awkwardly. “That... That was just to distract him, I guess. We... Don’t have to be friends, if you don’t want to.”

No, it... It wasn’t _that_ , he just...

Why...?

“DO YOU _WANT_ TO BE FRIENDS?” he asked, even more awkwardly, glancing away to avoid the potential ~~disgust~~ ~~annoyance~~ rejection he ~~would~~ might see in her expression.

But...

“Sure,” she chirped, without a second thought, and Papyrus’s eyesockets almost sparkled.

“W-WOWIE, THEN...! MY NAME’S PAPYRUS!!”

The human tilted her head slightly, “Isn’t that a font? And also Egyptian paper??”

...

His smile twitched.

She snorted, letting a short guffaw of sorts (that for some reason made his soul kind of confused and fluttery). “I’m kidding—well I mean, that stuff’s true but, I know how weird your guys’ names are, I’ve stopped questioning. Anyway,” she stuck her hand out haphazardly in his direction, “name’s Val, short for Valerie. ...Or Valentina, my dad named me and he’s weird.”

She then muttered something like, “So am I but that’s beside the point” and Papyrus couldn’t help but feel simultaneously befuddled and kind of... Kind of happy, sort of? Since he wasn’t really expecting to get a friend out of this?

I mean—obviously, since she flirted with him, that was clearly a gesture of friendship at the very least, right? And she’d helped remind that man that he was a bit confused about the proper amount of money for coffee; surely, she at least wanted to earn his favor.

...

~~But why?~~

Ah, but it didn’t matter! Of course they’d be friends now, it was only natural! He would be an amazing friend, and she must have seen that from the very beginning!

Therefore they proceeded to exchange numbers as well, for certainly, this would be a great friendship!

(And a very very platonic one!!)

(Completely!!!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pap didn't even get sugar in his coffee :c
> 
> 1 kudos = 1 sugar


	2. In Which Sans Makes An Appearance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Papyrus talks to Sans about... Whatever just happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~rip titles~~
> 
> this is super uber late s o r r y
> 
> it's probably pretty obvious i haven't written for this particular one in a while lmbo; i'm also on a time crunch more or less so sorry it's so short! (and also i didn't bother with the formatting this time, i'll probably add the fonts in later)
> 
> edit: future me has added in the fonts yaya c:

By the time Papyrus had made it back back home, he might as well _have_ had a cup of a coffee, with how jittery he was.

...Well, he did have _some_ coffee, truly, but—he didn't drink the whole thing because shortly after meeting that weird human (that he apparently made friends with too??) she left and he figured he should go home as well, so he took it with him in the car but hasn't touched it since really and—

But anyway that's not why he's so jittery? But he doesn't _really_ know why he _is_ so jittery??

Well! He, kind of does know, just a little maybe possibly but that's—

_He should stop and actually get the key in the keyhole shouldn't he._

Papyrus fumbled with the door on account of his brain finally agreeing to let him and, at last, the lock was unlocked, and he went to turn the knob—only to drop his keys in his haste. "CURSES!!" he cursed irritably, bending down to scoop them back up in his skeletal palm, just as the door clicked open in front of him, unprompted.

"...uhh, heeey."

Sans stood in the doorway, blinking, dressed in a robe and looking like he just woke up from a long winter's nap. "everything alright?" he went on further to ask. "you, uh. you were kinda taking a while?"

The taller skeleton stood back up to his full height, meeting Sans's gaze with renewed vigor. "YES!! EVERYTHING IS MOST CERTAINLY FINE!!!"

"...you sure?" He took in Papyrus's seemingly frazzled, much-too-fidgety-even-for-him appearance. Said fidgety skeleton nodded quickly.

"DEFINITELY, AND I'LL TELL YOU ALL ABOUT IT IN DETAIL BUT FIRST I HAVE BAGS THAT WE NEED TO CARRY IN, COULD YOU HELP ME?"

Despite the fact Papyrus was talking a mile a minute Sans just shrugged in his own version of an agreement, before trudging out into the yard after him.

“alright, so.” Sans rubbed his hands together, then plopped down on the couch, just as Papyrus finished putting away his own handful of items. “what’s the deal?”

The taller skeleton paused before walking over to the living room, continuing to be notably jittery in his movements. Unlike his brother, he remained standing. (Wholly because he was not lazy like said brother was and not at all because he wouldn’t be able to sit still for longer than three seconds.)

“THERE... WASN’T ONE, ACTUALLY—BUT THE NEXT BEST THING HAPPENED!! ...I THINK!”

Sans blinked slowly at him, prompting him to go on.

So he did.

He proclaimed dramatically (and maybe just a bit blithely), “I HAVE ACCIDENTALLY BEWITCHED ANOTHER HUMAN!!”

And, of all the things to do in response,

Sans just snorted.

“that’s all?”

“...‘THAT’S’—WHAT DO YOU _MEAN_ ‘THAT’S ALL?’” blurted Papyrus indignantly. “WHY IS THAT YOUR RESPONSE?!”

“heh, sorry,” the other chuckled, “just thought that was normal for you.”

Papyrus narrowed his eyesockets at him.

“THAT’S... AN INFURIATINGLY NICE THING TO SAY AND I HATE YOU FOR IT. ...BUT IT’S ALSO OBVIOUSLY TRUE! GOOD OBSERVATION, BROTHER!!”

“thanks.”

“ANYWAY, AS I WAS SAYING...”

After that, Sans interrupted his retelling of the events a total of three more times, mostly about nonsense that had zero relation to it at all—but funnily enough, Papyrus found it easier this time to resist the urge of stuffing him into the washing machine. That was a plus, probably.

What was also a plus was when his new human friend texted him out of the blue! Of course, Sans had to snatch his phone away and type the beginnings of a knock-knock joke when he wasn’t paying close enough attention but still!

(He made _sure_ to tell her the half-written message was his slob-of-a-brother, because Asgore forbid she think _he_ could stoop to that low of a caliber. He was a _classy_ skeleton.)

Overall, it was a great day, if Papyrus said so himself—because now he had another friend!

And not even Sans could ruin that for him!

~~No matter how hard he had laughed about her saying the paper thing.~~

* * *

**_Paperboy:_ ** _knock kno c_

_THAT WAS NOT ME I SWEAR, SANS STOLE MY PHONE,_

_ALSO, HELLO AGAIN HUMAN!! :)_

You snorted out a chortle as you read the list of texts, typing out a reply.

**_You:_ ** _lmao its all good m8. Whos sans tho?_

**_Paperboy:_ ** _YOUR LACK OF GRAMMAR CONCERNS ME BUT I SUPPOSE I WILL TELL YOU ANYWAY._

_SANS IS MY LAZYBONES BROTHER AND HE HAS NO REGARD FOR MONSTER DECENCY. HE ALSO THINKS HIS JOKES ARE FUNNY WHICH IS SIMPLY NOT TRUE! HE DOES NOT EVEN TRY TO MAKE THEM GOOD!!_

**_You:_ ** _lmaoo he sounds great_

It hadn’t even been a full day yet but you were _already_ wanting to see Papyrus again. You’d never really had a monster friend before, but he’d seemed so nice. ~~And cute.~~ _And_ he had a brother, apparently! Which was weirdly awesome to you; probably because you were an only sibling.

You wondered what he was like—maybe he was vastly different than Papyrus? Either way, you kind of really wanted to meet him too! ~~~~

(After all—if he was _anything_ like this dork, you were most definitely going to like him.)


End file.
